


[C] Done is Done

by OneofWebs



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Anxiety, Depression, Hurt/Comfort, Intrusive Thoughts, Love Confessions, M/M, Recovery, Self-Harm, Unreliable Narrator
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-03
Updated: 2019-11-03
Packaged: 2021-01-21 08:10:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,342
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21296294
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OneofWebs/pseuds/OneofWebs
Summary: After the world doesn't end, after everything should have been alright, Aziraphale finds himself very much not alright. Without purpose, without a drive, everything comes crashing down all at once. He can't help but find release in the strike of a blade, only these are wounds he can't heal. His only hope is that Crowley can, but how could Crowley ever care for him now?
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 31
Kudos: 225





	[C] Done is Done

**Author's Note:**

  * For [mutemail](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mutemail/gifts).

> Hoi again! Please heed the warnings with this one. It's not very graphic, but I realize it could be upsetting to some. I found it really cathartic to write, and I hope others find it cathartic to read. There is a good fair bit of comfort at the end, which I like to call the reward for getting through.
> 
> Do enjoy! Comments and kudos appreciated <3

Aziraphale remembered, painfully bright, the feeling of the knife the first time he’d used it. It was a holy blade; one he’d gone to stupid lengths to retrieve. In his foolish hopes at the time, he’d wanted someone in Heaven to find him before he could steal. He wanted them to berate him for coming back after they’d so kindly agreed to never bother him again—because he could survive Hell Fire. But he couldn’t. He couldn’t survive Hell Fire, and he hoped that he wouldn’t survive this, either, sometimes. The burning feel of it as it sliced in his skin.

The first time had been something simple. He’d been alone in the shop, near midnight. Crowley had left after a nice bottle of wine, and Aziraphale would continue to blame the wine. Even if the wine hadn’t been at fault, with the bottle once again full. All he’d had to do was roll up his sleeves and see the white expanse of his wrist to feel the first strike of temptation. He’d seen humans with tiny wrists, with wrists so small they could cross their fingers around them. Aziraphale’s wrist was not one of those, and he hated it.

He’d found the burn of the cut so wonderfully  _ something _ , he couldn’t place it. It replaced that empty feeling with something that reminded him that he was alive. Against all odds, against Heaven’s wishes—Aziraphale was alive, well, and on Earth. Slightly less well than he should have been, all things considered. It made the pain, the emptiness, even worse. He’d won a great victory, and now, in the left-over silence of a world gone slightly to the left, Aziraphale had only his thoughts.

Gabriel had once counseled for deep introspection and self-reflection. He’d believed it would help Aziraphale stay true to his path while being so far from home. It was the last thing Aziraphale needed, then, to be trapped inside himself. His thoughts came out in Gabriel’s voice—all scolding, evil things that Aziraphale believed. He’d done no such great service to Heaven for stopping the end of the world. He would be scorned, hated for it. Outcast. They would never speak to him again. And what would they want to speak to him for, anyhow? Aziraphale had entirely let himself go, in every way possible. Not only had he failed, but he was a failure.

It wasn’t until three nights later that Aziraphale found this wasn’t a scar that he could heal. Done with a holy blade, by his own hand—Aziraphale had doomed himself to wear it for the rest of his life. The scar was an ugly thing, horizontal across his wrist. Puffed up, red, and a horrid reminder of what he’d done. He’d given into temptation, weakness; the angels were right to cast him out. He had no strength left in him. That had been the night of the second scar, and it burned just as well as the first one had. Aziraphale hadn’t shed a tear. And he hated it.

Crowley came for lunch some odd weeks later. He’d had things to settle about, now that the world was not over and slightly stranger for it. There had been some trouble with the plants, he’d said, and he’d had to attend all his time to ensuring that they remembered just who had grown them to their beautiful grandeur. After the fearing had been done, he’d found himself a bit peckish, funnily enough. It took him straight to Aziraphale’s shop, where they sat and ate and made all the merriment they could. Aziraphale couldn’t remember a prior time where he’d watched Crowley stuff cake in his mouth.

He thought it was beautiful, really. Crowley. How free he was to do whatever he pleased. Crowley didn’t step to meet the floor; it rose to meet him that he might have a place for his feet. The way he commanded the room spoke of such confidence and power that Aziraphale wouldn’t be able to tell where he got it from. Not even if he asked. And he wouldn’t ask.

Instead, after Crowley left for the night, Aziraphale crawled into his own head and asked why  _ he _ couldn’t be like that. If Crowley could walk around like the world ticking on was a good thing, then why was Aziraphale moping about his shop? He hadn’t left in weeks. He’d sold a book just days prior. Not even for the things that he cared about could Aziraphale muster the strength to stand, the strength to feel  _ whole _ about it. That he’d done something great. Crowley had done something great. Crowley had done something  _ good _ . He’d thwarted Hell, after all, and that was what Aziraphale’s entire existence was meant for.

That was the night Aziraphale cried for the first time. The skin of his inner thigh was far more tender than that of his wrist, and even in the way the world lit up at the corners of his eyes for the feel of the knife, he still cried. He didn’t even bleed, but his skin peeled back when he cut it open. Angels didn’t bleed, not in human form. Aziraphale remembered the first war of angels and demons, the injury that left his leg a permanent gimp. But he was in a brand-new body, and still, there was nothing but the spark of pain. Aziraphale had thwarted Heaven, and he hated it.

When he was done, that night, there were four perfectly lined scars on his left thigh, and three on his right. They had closed up immediately in their horrid, puffy fashion like the scars on his wrist. It hadn’t meant anything. There was no blood to clean up from the bathroom floor. There was absolutely no  reprieve for what he had done, and the euphoria he’d sent with every strike of pain died away as the freshly opened gashes in his skin did. Closed up, as they were, and left a horrid reminder of everything he was.

Aziraphale thought he might try sleeping, after that, but it meant nothing. None of it meant anything, after that. When he slept, his dreams were in the voice of Gabriel, who reminded him just as deeply as the scars did that he was a failure. There was nothing good about him, not in the way of his size, his mind, or his heart. Aziraphale was no proper angel, and any angel who had enough Love in them for a demon would have no more for God and Her creations. Aziraphale loved nothing and no one. No one of importance.

Aziraphale had heard customers laughing on their way out of the shop. Laughing at him, he assumed. Laughing at him because he was just the way he was, and it seemed every passing day that the good of his clothes weren’t as good as they used to be. Straining against the buttons and the seams, because Aziraphale wasn’t a lean, mean fighting machine. Gabriel’s voice called in his head now that he wasn’t just soft, but he was disgusting. It might be easier if Aziraphale could just cut the pieces away, and he would certainly try for it.

Maybe the customers hadn’t been laughing at Aziraphale had all. Maybe it had just been the way he stopped idly in front of the mirror he left in his shop and despised the very glass of which the old antique thing reflected with. He’d seen the pop of his stomach, the round of his chest through his clothes. He looked like a fat old man who had certainly made a life on destroying everything he cared about, because that was all he was good for. If Gabriel wanted him to work off the gut, maybe Aziraphale would try to cut it away instead. Once, Aziraphale had loved his size, and now he hated it.

The scars did just as they’d all done before. They marred and mangled at his skin, left it broken apart and twisted. The euphoria died when the scars formed up, and Aziraphale was left lying on the floor of his shop. There wasn’t anything more pathetic than an angel like him, Gabriel said. The Gabriel in his mind, because the real Gabriel wouldn’t give him the time of day. He wasn’t worth it anymore—Heaven’s sight, Heaven’s love. He’d only not fallen for his weakness because God hadn’t a mind for him anymore. She wouldn’t look his way, because he wasn’t worth Her gaze.

It was only in the chime of the witching hours that Aziraphale pulled himself from the floor. He didn’t bother to fix up his clothes, and instead snapped his finger. Another frivolous miracle, Gabriel chided. Aziraphale was like a pouting child, desperate for attention by way of doing things he had been expressly told not to. Things he expressly knew were bad, frowned upon. He was acting out, throwing a tantrum. Believing, in that moment, that any type of attention at all was better than none.

No one would come for him, though. Not even a strongly worded note. Just the creak in the stairs as he climbed them. Once, the bookshop had been nothing more than a shop with a small kitchenette so Aziraphale could make tea. Now, some of the books had been squared away so he could turn a space into a living area, where he could collapse into downy pillows and feather blankets and wish for something more. A wish that wasn’t supposed to be for him and was the exact reason he deserved so little.

“Crowley won’t want you now,” Gabriel said. “Have you ever seen him with a man your size on his arm? Have you ever even seen him with a  _ man _ on his arm?”

“I can be anything,” Aziraphale retorted. “I could be a woman, if he wanted.”

“As if you’re not the problem, sunshine,” came Gabriel’s sneer. When Aziraphale looked for the sound of the voice, he was alone in his room. On his nightstand, what he’d swore he’d left on the floor of his shop, was the holy blade.

From where it sat, it looked like the mightiest sword Heaven had ever crafted. A large, dangerous tool meant only for hurting. It loomed over Aziraphale like a threat, a warning, a  _ temptation _ . If Crowley hadn’t wanted him before the world didn’t end, when he still had strength at the best of times, why would he want Aziraphale after the fact? Now, where all Aziraphale could muster up to do was flip onto his back instead of lying on his stomach. He only ate when Crowley was there to watch him. He didn’t drink.

And that was just then thing of it, then. After he’d eaten with Crowley, only to eat because he knew that’s what Crowley would expect him to do, he would cut. The guilt of having eaten was so dreadfully unbearable—but he wasn’t a human. He couldn’t just so easily shove his fingers down his throat and be rid of the filth he’d ingested. But maybe he could cut it away. He tried, desperately, and he hated it. He hated everything that he’d done, to the point where his eyes drooped heavily with an emptiness he’d never known. Yet, he couldn’t sleep.

All was fair in a cruel joke, he supposed, and rolled over once the gashes had swelled shut.

It wasn’t often unbearably hot in Soho, but it was humid. Aziraphale once hadn’t cared, but the heaviness had just spread through his limbs. Farther and farther it went on with each scar he left himself. Some of the scars had just scarred over others, and some were left on their own in places he’d tried to slice and felt less satisfaction for it. Places he didn’t care for, anymore, like in crests over the swell of his chest. Crowley would never  _ see _ , so who would there to be around to stare and gape?

Aziraphale figured that nobody would. The customers didn’t pay attention to him; they were there for the books. Always for the books. Aziraphale was just the annoying background piece who wouldn’t let them have what they wanted. So, on that particularly humid and unbearable day in Soho, Aziraphale had left his overcoat on the back of his chair and rolled up his sleeves. He thought he might take to wearing bracelets to help hide the scars, but he’d need a significant wardrobe change for that to work.

He couldn’t very well ask Crowley. Changing on his own might spark suspicion. But he had been considering the possibility of a thick, leather band done up with lace ties like they used to in the old days that he loved so much. He still loved the smell of leather and the books that were bound in it. A leather band might be what he needed to feel a bit better, as of late. Something small and silly like that shouldn’t cause comfort, but Aziraphale thought that it might. He was pathetic enough to stoop to anything and was already imagining what colors he could get. And he hated it.

The bell to the shop rang, and Aziraphale turned to greet the customer as he always did. His sleeves still rolled to his elbows. It wasn’t a customer that he greeted, and he didn’t greet them, either. He barely managed a smile as his face fell at the sight of Crowley, who only pushed his glasses up into his hair with a cock of his head. That wasn’t the normal response he received, unexpected visit or not.

“I didn’t mean to shock you, angel,” Crowley laughed. “You usually don’t look so put out when I stop by.”

“Oh, oh, no,” Aziraphale managed to return the laugh. “You’ve merely caught me by surprise, is all! It’s such a perfect day for you, I could only assume you were out—”

“Angel,” Crowley said with a sudden seriousness.

Aziraphale realized, all at once, how stupid he’d been. He was waving his hands about in the sudden wave of anxiety that had taken him. He shouldn’t have let himself succumb to that so easily, because now Crowley had  _ seen _ . He’d seen the scars. The horizontals and the verticals of them. Only on his wrists, but Crowley wasn’t a fool. Crowley had always been so clever, so true, and now he was realizing just how much time he’d wasted on Aziraphale. Six thousand years of  _ time _ , his own allegiance. Everything, for an angel who couldn’t even  _ feel _ properly, and—

“Out, all of you out!” Crowley was shouting. He’d stolen a book straight from someone’s hand and shoved it back on the self with a practiced hand that said he knew exactly where it belonged. “Shop’s closed, did you hear? I said get out!” he screamed.

Crowley’s shouts were bellowing things that shook the ground, and the books shook in fear for him. They’d never feared him before, but his sudden  _ anger _ had boiled up and over the edges of his body to leave scales in their wake like stew left too long to simmer. Crowley was grabbing people, pushing and pulling, until they had all been tossed from the shop. The door locked. The sign changed. The blinds drawn. All of it culminated to the fact that Crowley was still in the shop. He hadn’t left. And Aziraphale hadn’t even managed to say a word.

“Aziraphale,” Crowley said.

Aziraphale’s lips didn’t move, not on their own. He tried with some effort to reply, but all he could do was stare down at his arms like they weren’t his. His voice wasn’t his own, and it stammered in its horrid confusion. Without a person to connect to, Aziraphale’s voice didn’t know what to say. He stumbled and whimpered and eventually said nothing. He hated it.

“You need to sit down, angel. Come with me.”

Aziraphale didn’t take Crowley’s hand. He watched as his body took Crowley’s hand and felt the way his body walked across the shop, Crowley’s hand around his. Not around his wrist, where Crowley would usually grab. Crowley wouldn’t dare touch something so nasty, so horrid. Something so representative of  _ weakness _ . Aziraphale thought nothing for the tremble in Crowley’s fingers, the warmth of his touch. All he knew was the fear that Crowley would hate him, berate him. Become the new Gabriel that spurned him on in his darkest moments.

Crowley sat Aziraphale down on the sofa. Aziraphale thought he might spin the armchair to sit in it, but Crowley just dropped to his knees before Aziraphale. His hand still just where it had been, tightly gripped around Aziraphale’s fingers. Crowley used his iron grip to yank Aziraphale’s arm out for him to see. To see the entirety of the damage, the way the scars trailed down his skin. Aziraphale watched it all happen from somewhere else in the shop, like his body wasn’t his. And he trembled.

“Aziraphale—” Crowley’s voice sounded wretched. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Whatever do you mean, my dear?” Aziraphale tried to smile. Thought he did, anyhow. Crowley didn’t seem convinced.

“Don’t  _ do _ that. Whenever something is wrong, you always,  _ always _ , try to hide it away like it’s nothing. This—” Crowley yanked again on Aziraphale’s arm so it was closer, so he could run his fingers down the scars, “—is something. This is—I don’t even know,” he admitted.

“It’s disgusting, isn’t it?” Aziraphale laughed. “An angel. Principality of the Eastern Gate. Not even strong enough to resist—”

“It’s  _ not _ ,” Crowley assured. “Aziraphale, listen to me. Listen to me,  _ please _ —will you look at me? You haven’t looked at me once.”

Aziraphale thought he had been looking at Crowley, but he realized then that it was a thought of Crowley. Not Crowley. The thought of Crowley had been frowning, angry, and disgusted. He’d been ready to back away with a revolted look strewn over his face and never talk to Aziraphale again. This Crowley, the one Aziraphale looked at then, had his brows down up in worry. Mortified concern. His eyes were golden, and they trembled. His teeth dug into his bottom lip as he thought of what to say.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Crowley asked, nothing more than a whimper. “I would’ve—I could’ve  _ done _ something. I don’t know, but  _ something _ .”

“I didn’t want you to hate me,” Aziraphale admitted. It felt a strange lightness to say. “I didn’t want you to go away.”

Aziraphale thought he sounded like a petulant child who didn’t want to lose his favorite toy. He expected Crowley to treat him as such, in the same harsh manner he’d always been treated with. In Heaven. Instead, Crowley’s grip on him suddenly softened. It disappeared altogether until it returned around his jaw, with both hands. Crowley was cradling his face and looking at him with something so deep and wonderful that Aziraphale didn’t know what it was.

“Leave you? No, angel, never. I’d never think to do something like that. Not for this. Maybe if you tried to get me to wear tartan again—” Crowley stopped himself. Aziraphale expected the joke to continue, for things to go a path he wasn’t prepared for. They didn’t. He watched Crowley’s face crinkle.

“Why?” Aziraphale asked. “Look at me—and they’re everywhere. I’ve done it so many times, Crowley, and I—” Aziraphale was crying, then. He hadn’t even realized until his vision had blurred, and he couldn’t  _ see _ Crowley. He scrubbed furiously at his eyes—he  _ needed _ to see Crowley. “I’m so  _ weak _ and disgusting. How could you even think to stay?”

“Because you don’t leave people you care about, angel, and I care about you. In six thousand years, I’ve never left. Maybe I haven’t said it, but I’ll say it if you need to hear it. That I care about you, I mean. And I do, I mean. I care about you more than I can—it scares me, angel,” Crowley cleared his throat. “It scares me, how much I care. It scares me to think I might have lost you.”

He had lost Aziraphale once, after all.

“I don’t deserve that,” Aziraphale whispered.

Crowley knocked their foreheads together and wore a tight smile. “You deserve every star I ever built, angel. I need you to believe that. Maybe I’m no angel, but you’ve always said I was  _ nice _ —” Crowley pulled away just enough, then.

He cradled Aziraphale’s hand in his own and used his free one to smooth down the length of his forearm, following the scars with the tips of his fingers. He followed each one individually, and slowly, and never took his eyes off of Aziraphale’s. Aziraphale stared at him, back. His gaze was so captivating that by the time Aziraphale thought to ask what he was doing; it was already done. Crowley’s hand peeled away from his arm, and in its wake, left something  _ nice _ .

“Consider it the last angel thing I’ll ever be capable of,” Crowley muttered.

Each scar had turned into a golden line. Never healed, not capable enough to heal, but different. They were bumpy and rough as they had been, but they weren’t red and jarring, anymore. The gold was a soft color, like Crowley’s eyes but with more kindness, and in the right light—no. Aziraphale didn’t think he’d ever be able to not see the scars. To not remember that they were there. Ignoring them didn’t seem an option, but this felt  _ better _ . It didn’t fix it. Aziraphale wasn’t healed. But he felt lighter, for the moment.

“Crowley,” Aziraphale breathed out.

“I’d like to do it to them all, in time,” Crowley said. “I want you to show me everything.”

“It’s not—it’s not worth it. You’ll never fix what I’ve done—”

“I don’t  _ mean _ to fix it,” came Crowley’s hiss, an accidental thing. Nothing out of malice, only a worry that had him forgetting himself. “I mean to make it something different.”

“What do you mean, Crowley?” Aziraphale sniffed. “How can you make it different?”

“You must have been so upset,” Crowley whispered. “You must have been so afraid, so in pain. That’s why you did this to yourself. But if I can make it something out of  _ love _ , then maybe—”

“Love?” Aziraphale squeaked.

Crowley’s voice caught in his throat, and Aziraphale realized that Crowley was on the verge of tears, himself. In that moment, Aziraphale wanted to do nothing more but to take Crowley in his arms and assure him that it would be okay. Crowley shouldn’t waste a single tear on him. He would do better. Aziraphale would be stronger than he had been—but that’s exactly what Crowley had been trying to tell him. This was strong, where he was. Sitting there, letting Crowley look at him, admitting things. He could have shied away. He could have thrown Crowley from the shop. But he didn’t. He sat there with him. Stared at him.

“I love you,” Crowley whispered, his hands around Aziraphale’s face again. The world was theirs, in that moment. Quiet and alone, and only theirs. “I need you to know that. Maybe it doesn’t mean anything—maybe it doesn’t  _ fix _ anything, but maybe—”

“Oh, Crowley,” Aziraphale shuddered, “it means  _ everything _ .”

He fell into Crowley, then, his arms draped loosely about his neck. Crowley held onto him tight, the tips of his nails digging into Aziraphale’s back through the thin layer of his shirt. Like Crowley was afraid if he let go for too long, Aziraphale would discorporate right in front of him. Crowley couldn’t bear the thought of it, so he only held tighter.

“Come to me,” Crowley said, “when you’re hurting, when you’re scared. I’ll be there for you. I won’t let you do this alone.”

Aziraphale nodded and buried his face into Crowley’s neck. He breathed in the scent of him, felt the tightness of his hold. In it, there was a different type of feeling. A euphoria Aziraphale had never felt, never experienced, and he wanted to know where it would lead. He wanted to feel Crowley’s hands on the rest of him, turning his scars gold. Crowley’s hands on his chest, over his stomach, on the soft skin of his thighs. He hoped, he  _ dared _ to hope, that Crowley would stay through it all. That Crowley would dare to  _ want _ .

Maybe Crowley’s love wasn’t going to fix this. Maybe the fear would remain and maybe the temptation would linger, but Aziraphale wouldn’t have to sit through it alone. Crowley would be there. Crowley would hold his hands, hold  _ him _ , kiss him, even, maybe. Aziraphale hoped there would be kisses. He’d seen humans do it and he  _ liked  _ the kissing. The way it looked. The way it made people feel. He even let out the briefest chuckle, which had Crowley pulling back.

“Are you alright?” Crowley asked.

“At the moment,” Aziraphale admitted. “I was thinking about kissing. How silly is that? Kissing—”

“It’s not silly at all,” Crowley said, suddenly only inches away. “Would you, perhaps, like to kiss?”

Aziraphale nodded. He closed his eyes and let Crowley do the work. He let Crowley inch closer. He let Crowley initiate, drive, and finally press their lips together. The bright, burning that erupted between them had Aziraphale shuddering where he sat. When Crowley kissed, Aziraphale kissed back. He put his hands in Crowley’s hair, pulled Crowley closer, and let Crowley lead their little dance. It felt safe, he realized, to put himself in Crowley’s hands like that. To close his eyes, as he had, and let Crowley lead the way.

Crowley wouldn’t hurt him, he knew. Crowley wouldn’t say things that would hurt him, either. There was nothing more that Crowley wanted to do than to cherish him, to make him feel safe and secure. To have him know that it wouldn’t be a journey he had to face alone. But really, there never had been such a journey. For six thousand years, Crowley had been right there. Aziraphale wouldn’t have wished it a single other way.

**Author's Note:**

> 𓆏 𓆏  
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